A Mutual Healing
by IMustHaveSaidItWrong
Summary: Isobel Crawley pays Doctor Clarkson a visit that may change her life.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Please be patient with me, it's my first published fic and I am not a native English speaker. Thanks!**

She had no idea how on earth could she let that happen. How could _they_ let that happen?

She lay in bed next to him. In his bed. She was shivering from the rather cold wind that was blowing through the slightly opened window. With his hand, covered with a bandage, on her naked waist, he was asleep, she thought, but she dared not to check if it was true. She could feel his warm breath on the nape of her neck, but that didn't make her feel any less cold. It wasn't only the wind that made her shiver; she kept on thinking about what has happened between them.

In the evening, she came to his house to ask if he really meant what did said when he asked her to return to the hospital. Ever since they bumped into each other that day and he asked her, she constantly thought about his offer to return to the hospital and help him and the nurses. She knew the hospital was short-staffed, but she felt she wasn't ready to come back. She still couldn't really deal with her son's death, and didn't feel like finding herself something to be occupied with would do her any good, since she couldn't really focus on the simplest tasks at home, not to mention having to deal with all the business that was going on at the hospital, with all the patients and so much paperwork to be done. Needless to say, she felt that her inability to do her work properly would affect the hospital as much as it would affect her, so what was really the point in this?

Yet two days later, she woke up and felt different. While dressing up she looked at herself in the mirror and knew this day was somehow different. She didn't feel this pain in her chest anymore, the pain she felt every single day since Matthew died. Maybe it wasn't that the pain left her entirely, but it felt different. She felt different. Actually, for the first time in ages, she was happy she woke up. She thought that this meant something, maybe it was the time she should try and move on a bit with her life? She knew very well that Matthew would hate to see her in such a state, completely unlike herself, not being able to live her life the way she used to, not being able to take active part in the life of Downton, not feeling _useful_. And suddenly, she thought of doctor Clarkson's offer – maybe that was it? Maybe she should give it a try and see what it will lead to? Deep inside, underneath the thick layer of grief, she knew that she had to go on and try to make a new life for herself, since her old life has ended with her son's death. Maybe it was the right moment to do it.

She gave herself the whole afternoon to be sure she wouldn't change her mind, but by the time the sun was setting, and with a little plan on how she would hold this conversation, she was almost sure that she should go and tell doctor Clarkson that she wanted to get back to working at the hospital. She decided it would be better to go straight to the hospital and meet him at this office just as he would finish work and prepare to go home, and maybe have a quick chat about her future duties. Yet when she arrived, the nurse informed her that doctor Clarkson had already left home. A bit baffled that her plans had to be changed, she saw she had no choice but to go and pay him a visit at his own house, which, she's just realised, she's never been to, in all those years she knew him.

His house was a small, but very neatly kept cottage, a few minutes by walk from the hospital. She noticed that his garden looked very neat too; as she would never thought that he had the time to keep the house in such a state by himself, she assumed that he probably had some help, a maid, or a housekeeper maybe? He always seemed to be at the hospital, so there must have been someone to look after the household. As she approached the gate, she saw the light in the kitchen window. She walked up to the door and knocked three times. After a moment, the door opened, and she certainly didn't expect it to be the doctor himself who opened it, yet there he was. Apparently, there was no housekeeper. For some reason, she tried not to look at his face, and her eyes wandered a bit lower and she noticed that his shirt was unbuttoned at the top and his sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, and he was wiping his hands in a cloth.

"Mrs. Crawley? What brings you here?," he asked her, just as surprised to see her as she was to see him.

"Hello doctor, I hope I am not interrupting? Maybe I should come back another time if you are busy?" she started to back down and was about to bid him goodbye and leave, when he stopped her.

"No, of course you are not interrupting anything, nonsense. Please do come in," he opened the door for her and let her inside.

"I went to the hospital to look for you, but the nurse told me you already left," she started in a calm voice, following him inside. 'You see, there's something that I wanted to talk to you about, so I figured I shall come here, but I see it is not the most perfect time,' she continued when they entered a small sitting room. It was then that she noticed something else about him – his hands and the cloth were covered with blood, not with an excessive amount of it, but still, it was noticeable.

"What happened?," she asked and pointed to his hands. "Are you hurt? What's all this blood?" she approached him a bit.

"Oh, nothing, if you could just wait here a bit, I will get back to the kitchen and finish cleaning up the mess. You see, today at the hospital, just before I left home, we had a rather unpleasant case of a very unlucky patient, a little girl, who apparently cut her hand with some glass, and she wouldn't really allow me to take it out after I examined her," he continued, still keeping the cloth on his hand, "She was very afraid and just when I was about to take the glass out of her hand, she shook it very violently, and knocked the bottle with the antiseptic, which in turn broke into pieces and hurt my hand. I didn't see it a big cut, I calmed the girl and took the glass out of her hand soon after. She was taken care of by the nurse later on, I bandaged my hand and headed home, but when I got here, I saw that my cut was bigger than I supposed, the bandage started leaking and I discovered a tiny piece of glass in it, so I had to patch it up again in the kitchen. The problem is, it's my right hand, and I am right-handed, so it takes longer time to clean the wound, that is why I let you in to see the house and myself this terrible state of mess, for which I really am sorry," he ended his story with a little sigh.

"For heaven's sake, doctor, why haven't you just go and take care of your hand and tell me all this in the meantime?" she was quite surprised at his actions. "But you know what, since I am here and you said you had troubles cleaning the wound yourself, I might actually be a lot of help right now," she said, smiling a little, starting to feel that nice warm feeling one usually experiences when there's something to be done and one's help is needed. She felt she might be useful again, even for a little moment, and her smile widened a bit at the thought, which did not escape his attention.

"Well, that certainly would be helpful, Mrs. Crawley," he answered and returned her smile. "Shall we proceed to my provisional hospital, the kitchen, that is, since I would not like to get another room in the house as messy as is the kitchen right now?" he smiled again, noticing that the red stain on the bandage was getting bigger.

"Of course, doctor Clarkson, after you," she replied, took him by the elbow and allowed him to lead her. She was still smiling, which was rather surprising for him to see, since he hasn't seen her smile in such a long time. "Come on, doctor, and let me fix you."


	2. Chapter 2

It took her a few seconds to realise what she has just said to him, and how forward and bold that must have sounded. Yet he didn't say a word, he just led them towards the kitchen table, where his medical bag and few dressing materials and bandages were placed. They sat on the neighbouring sides of the small kitchen table, and she took the cloth off his hand. The cut wasn't really deep and there wasn't any glass stuck in it, but the pieces from the shattered bottle must have cut some minor blood vessels, because his hand was still bleeding.

"You were quite lucky it was antiseptic, you know," she said, cleaning the cut.

"I suppose that was indeed a blessing in disguise," he replied. "But what would you think of me, a doctor who cannot fix his own wound properly."

"You are right-handed, I don't suppose you would be able to fix it without help. But why didn't you ask a nurse to help you?"

"I told you Mrs. Crawley, I thought it was a minor cut," he replied, a little bit amused at that point.

She smiled at him.

"It turns out it was more than you thought, doctor Clarkson," she replied, looking into his eyes. "But there, it's clean now, let me just get a bandage and we'll be done here."

He observed her carefully as she applied a gauze to his hand. Her touch was ever so gentle, and he felt a strangely nice sensation in his chest when her fingers touched his skin. He looked at her face; with her eyes down, focused on her task, she couldn't see that he was watching her. He looked at her cheeks which were flushed just a little bit, and her lips, which she bit while she was wrapping his hand. He was so enchanted by her that he didn't hear her when she asked him to put his hand a little bit up. That made her look up at him, and she noticed his stare.

"Doctor Clarkson, do you mind…?", she tried to lift up his hand.

"Yes… what? Oh, yes. I'm sorry", he replied, finally emerging from his reverie, as he raised his hand, allowing her to finish bandaging.

"Now I just need scissors to cut the bandage", she said in a shy tone, rather abashed by his sudden absent-mindedness and then discovering he was watching her so intensely.

"They were somewhere on the table," he replied in a similarly hushed way, using his good hand to roam the surface of the table in search of the scissors. She also went on searching, and just as her hand found the scissors, Clarkson's own hand did the same and he ended up holding her hand in his over the scissors. Neither one of them moved, and the doctor noticed how red were her cheeks. Isobel Crawley was blushing like a school girl! They gazed into each other's eyes for a split second and then he retracted his hand, not wanting to embarrass her.

"Well, there you go," she said as she cut the bandage and tied the whole dressing, desperate not to look at him. "I think it's going to be alright now".

For a moment there was a perfectly still silence between them until she noticed that she still hasn't released his wounded hand from hers.

"I'm sorry, Richard... I mean, doctor Clarkson... I don't know what's gotten into me today," she started, but he just grasped her hand in both of his own, suddenly encouraged by the fact that she called him by his given name.

"Isobel, don't apologise. You fixed that wound very well, thank you for your help."

"I am a trained nurse, Richard, remember that?", she reminded him, smiling a little. Somehow it didn't bother her that they started calling each other by their given names just like that.

"Yes, I know. And one of the best we've ever had here.", Richard smiled. "Thank you."

There was a moment of silence between them, and suddenly he remembered that she came here to talk to him.

"You wanted to talk about something, am I right? That is why you came here?", he inquired, curious as to what she was going to discuss with him. "Is there a problem of any nature?"

"No, actually I wanted to ask you if it would be possible for me to come back to the hospital", she wondered. "I can start as soon as you will allow me."

"Well, if you are perfectly sure you would like to come back, I think we could arrange it," he started. "But you know we're a bit short-staffed and there's going to be a lot of work to do." He couldn't imagine her working long hours, her, who already wasn't sleeping at night because of what happened to her son. He couldn't imagine her facing the patients, not now, not so soon after Matthew's death. He felt that she wanted this because she couldn't deal with his death on her own. Isobel Crawley, who was always there for other people, needed someone to be here for her.

"Yes,", she said to him, and her reply indeed made him sure his suppositions were right.

"Actually this is exactly why I want to come back".

"I just hope you are absolutely sure that it is what you want. Do you feel like it is the right time?"

She looked at him, not sure what he meant.

"I don't understand, why wouldn't it be the right time?", she asked, a little bit taken aback.

Richard sighed.

"I mean are you sure you are prepared to come back? Wouldn't you like a little more time to… heal?"

Now that stupefied her. Off all people she expected him to be more positively inclined toward her decision.

"Well I came to think that I would be of much better use in the hospital tending to the patients, in a place where I am needed, than if I sat at home all day. But maybe you think it was silly of me. Maybe you are right," she gasped, tears started forming in her eyes. "Maybe you are right, I should be staying at home and staring at the walls, since that is what I've been doing every single day since my son died. Maybe a mother who's lost her only child is good for nothing else. But you must know this, doctor, no amount of time will ever help me heal, as you call it, nothing will ease my pain, not when my life's over. Because he was my whole life, you know?", she nearly shouted at him.

"Isobel, I… you misunderstood me…", Richard started, completely in shock of what this light-hearted conversation they started over his wounded hand has become. "I didn't mean to say…", he leaned towards her, trying to get a hold of her hand, but she moved back from him.

"What did you _mean_ to say, then?", she mocked him. She was almost crying.

"I just… I was just worried about you. I am worried. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that. Please forgive me", he gasped as he tried again and finally managed to hold her by the hand. Isobel tried to withdraw it, but he held her firmly.

"Doctor Clarkson, what are you doing?", she asked, looking confused, and got up from her chair. His hand was still holding hers.

"Listen… you cannot possibly think I said that intentionally. I never wanted to hurt you", he replied, not giving up. "I am sorry. I didn't mean it to sound that way. What I wanted to say is that I am worried about you. Every time I come by your house to check on you I am worried if you are strong enough to face the world. Now with what you've just told me, I am worried if you feel strong enough to face what you will see at the hospital. I know you want to feel useful again, I understand that completely," he continued and noticed that little by little, she started to look less hurt and tense. He actually felt her hand grasping his own. "but there will be people that are hurt, that are in pain, people that are dying. Are you sure you are ready to face it? I know it feels like immersing yourself in work would help you get your mind off this tragedy, but you are a human, you need to mourn and to cry. "

And just as he said it, he saw tears streaming down her face, but she didn't say a word. They stood in silence, so close to each other, their hands still together.

"I know one day you will feel better. I just don't want you to make this decision too quickly. You have a beautiful grandson that needs you. You must be strong for him. And most importantly, you must be strong for your own sake. You should devote this time of healing to focus on yourself, and your family, you need to be with people who love you and care for you. That is why I feel you should take your time and maybe think of coming back a little bit later."

He expected her to say something now, but as she did not, he continued."And remember, your life is not over, Isobel, it's just changed drastically, but it's not over. And if you don't want to take care of it yourself, you should allow someone to help you."

He needn't say anything more; she understood perfectly who he meant, and all of a sudden, she leaned towards him and buried her head in his chest, finally allowing herself to weep soundly.

"There,", he said, embracing her and holding her close. "You should cry if you feel like you need it. It's only natural."

And so she did, and he tried to comfort her as best as he could. He stroked her back gently, and whispered soothing words gently in her ear. It took her some time to calm herself, and when she did, she pulled away from him and looked straight into his eyes.

"Thank you. It seems I really needed that."

Richard just smiled at her.

"Well, I think it's time for me to go home", she said and started moving towards the door.

"I'll accompany you, it's too late for you to go alone", he replied.

When they reached the hall, he helped her put her coat on and put his own, with her help, as it was hard for him to do it with his bandaged hand. She helped him button it up, and suddenly, probably overcome by all the emotions of the evening, he leaned towards her and placed the most sweet and tender kiss on her lips. He felt her tense and she withdrew. He felt a sting of embarrassment; he clearly misread her and ruined everything that happened between them earlier.

She cleared her throat and he opened the door for her. They left the house, and just as he was closing the door, he felt her hand on his arm, and she kissed him. He dropped his key and not even a second passed when they were kissing each other fiercely at his doorstep, him leaning on the door, and she leaning on him. He tried to get a hold of the door handle, and as soon as he did it, he pushed it open and felt her hustling him inside.

**A/N: I am SO sorry it took me so long to update! I promise to do it faster next time. Also, I am not entirely pleased with how this chapter turned out, this is probably the 10th version of it. But still, I would love to read what you think about it so feel free to post a review! Thanks!**


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